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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23668594">Unexpected Surprises Are...Surprising</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/nixster627/pseuds/nixster627'>nixster627</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alex Manes Loves Michael Guerin, Domestic Fluff, Kid Fic, Michael Guerin &amp; Alex Manes Use Their Words</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-03 00:53:42</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,494</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23668594</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/nixster627/pseuds/nixster627</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Michael and Alex were supposed to be having a quiet night in Alex's house when a knock at the door changes both their worlds.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Michael Guerin/Alex Manes</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>72</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Unexpected Surprises Are...Surprising</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This story came from a dream I had where I just filled in the spots I don't remember, but I like how it turned out.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Michael and Alex were planning on having a quiet evening in. Alex was in the kitchen putting the finishing touches on dinner while Michael was laying down on the couch listening to whatever was on the tv and petting Buffy who was laying on his chest.</p>
<p>It had been a long week of sorting through Project Shepherd files, but now, they get a whole weekend to relax and they are finally on the same page of their relationship. Of course, that is when life comes in to disrupt them, with a knock at the door.</p>
<p>“If that is Valenti with more Project Shepherd stuff, I swear, I am going to slam the door in his face,” Michael mumbled as he reluctantly got up from his place on the couch and moved slowly towards the door.</p>
<p>Apparently he was moving too slowly because whoever was at the door knocked again...and would not stop knocking. “I’m comin’, I’m comin’, jeez, quit knocking would you.” Michael groaned as he finally reached the door.</p>
<p>“What could you possibly want right now?” He yelled as he opened the door and saw no one. Until he looked down.</p>
<p>“Are you Michael Guerin?” A little boy, who looked to be about seven, asked.</p>
<p>Michael just stared at him. The kid had dark, curly hair and big, brown eyes and he was clutching his backpack like his life depended on it and looking over his shoulder every few seconds. The longer Michael went without responding, the more unsure the kid looked standing there.</p>
<p>“Who was at the door?” Alex asks as he comes around the corner into the front hallway. He stops when he sees a child standing on his porch and his boyfriend standing there gaping at the kid. “Uh, hi. What’s your name?” Alex asks, hoping it will jump start some conversation about why a child who looks almost exactly how he imagines a young Michael would look, is standing at his doorstep.</p>
<p>“My name is Henry Cole and Michael Guerin is my father,” the kid, Henry, states with certainty, “at least that is what my mom always told me.” He keeps looking over his shoulder like he is afraid someone is chasing after him.</p>
<p>Michael’s eyes widen at this even though, in hindsight, it should have been obvious by how much the kid looks like him. He has so many questions he wants to ask, the first one being how, but that seems like an inappropriate thing to ask a child who looks like he is about to freak out and run away.</p>
<p>“And who is your mom?” Alex continues to ask questions because it seems like Michael is useless at the moment, stuck in his own head</p>
<p>“Can I come in? I promise to explain it all if you let me come inside,” the kid says over half the sentence still looking over his shoulder and jumping a little when the bushes and trees rustle with the wind.</p>
<p>“Sure. We were just about to eat dinner, do you want some?” Alex hopes that offering the kid food will make him less jumpy or afraid.</p>
<p>Henry enters the house and looks up at Michael, who looks like he has something he wants to say, and unsurely says “I guess...if that’s okay with you.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, we can...eat and talk...at the same time...over dinner.” Michael says slowly, like he doesn’t properly know how to word things. He blames it on the shock of finding out that he may possibly have a child.</p>
<p>When they get into the kitchen, the kid sits in a chair, still holding his backpack against his chest like a shield, and looks between Michael and Alex who appear to be having, what Henry thinks, is a conversation in their mind. In reality, Michael is trying to convey to Alex how freaked out he is and how he definitely <em>did not know</em> he had a child. Alex, in turn, is giving him the ‘how is there always something going on with you’ look.</p>
<p>“So you guys can talk with your minds too?” Henry innocently asks, not realizing that the two men in front of him would pause at that.</p>
<p>“What do you mean <em>too</em>? Can you talk with your mind?” Michael questions him, staring intently at the kid trying to figure him out, at which Henry makes that face that kids make when they realize they said something they shouldn't have.</p>
<p>“I may or may not be able to, but I seem to be giving up a lot of information and not getting any in return. I know you’re my father and all, but how do I know I can trust you,” Henry built up confidence as he went on and stared back at Michael just as intently.</p>
<p>“We have yet to establish that I am actually your father, kid, and until we do I am going to keep my information close to my chest,” Michael shoots back. He sees Alex leave the room in his peripheral vision so that he can give the two of them more room to talk without him listening in.</p>
<p>“I told you my name’s Henry and I know it’s you. My mom gave me a photo of the two of you. See,” Henry pulls a photo out of his bag of Michael and a woman he definitely recognizes, Natalie Cole. “She told me she met you when she came to Roswell to get the history of some big event that happened here. I think they were doing some kind of special exhibit at the Smithsonian.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, I remember, she was trying to figure out was the crash of 1947 really was and I told her that I would show her around Fosters’ Ranch because I was a ranch hand there that summer,” Michael thinks back to his second summer after high school when Alex decided that he wasn’t going to come back between basic training and his first posting, so he ended up with some unique ways to entertain himself.</p>
<p>Natalie had worked at the Smithsonian as someone who gathered information that historians would inspect and interpret. She started out as the first friend he ever had that wasn’t from Roswell, but with the late nights out at Fosters’ Ranch and the lunches together at the Crashdown, it turned into more. It wasn’t really a relationship, more of a friends-with-benefits situation when both of them agreed that they shouldn’t start a relationship when they both knew she was going to be leaving at the end of the summer anyway.</p>
<p>“How old are you anyway, kid?” And when the kid gave him a deadpan look, he added on, “Henry.”</p>
<p>“I’m almost nine,” Henry said proudly.</p>
<p>“So you’re eight,” Michael shot back wishing this kid would just answer the questions he is asking.</p>
<p>“Well I am closer to nine than I am to when I turned eight so I think I should be counted as a nine-year-old already,” Henry responded with so much confidence that Michael was a little taken aback.</p>
<p>“That’s not how age works,” he said as he stands up from the table. “I’ll be right back, just start eating this,” Michael pours him a bowl of some of the soup that Alex had been making early that might be a little cold now. He walks over to where Alex is sitting on the couch, pretending to watch the tv.</p>
<p>“So...I’m pretty sure he’s my kid. I mean, I can’t know for certain unless we got a DNA test done, but he is probably mine,” Michael rambles on when Alex looks up at him, “I know this is a lot to take in and I don’t even know where his mom is...I kind of forgot to ask him about that,” he keeps going when Alex doesn’t cut him off, “If you want, I can take him somewhere else, we could go stay with Isabel for a night or so if it makes you uncomfortable or something…” his speech fades out as he doesn’t really know how to continue and Alex is just staring at him with a deadpan look.</p>
<p>“I’m not going to kick you out just because a kid that you never knew about shows up out of nowhere,” Alex starts making sure that Michael keeps looking at him when he attempts to look away. “You are as blindsided by this as I am and we will figure it out together,” he says as he grabs Michael’s hands to pull him closer, “We will go back in there and we will find out why he is here and where his mom is together,” Alex finishes as he stands up and pulls Michael in for a quick kiss before heading back towards the kitchen.</p>
<p>In that moment, Michael loves Alex more than he ever has before because Alex didn’t run away from it this time and he didn’t let Michael run away from it either.</p>
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